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Laura Harris
Promoting the new ATA-sponsored website budgetmore.com was just one item on the agenda for ATA President Frank Bruseker as he met with teachers and media during the recently launched president’s tour.
Kicking off the tour on May 29 with stops in Valleyview, Peace River and Grande Prairie, the tour saw Bruseker visiting Claresholm, Fort Macleod and Lethbridge on June 1.
Borne of a resolution passed at the 2007 Annual Representative Assembly held on the May long weekend, the president’s tour gives teachers the opportunity to ask questions on issues such as education funding, the teachers’ unfunded pension liability, and the outlook for the 2007/08 school year when teachers in 52 of 62 jurisdictions will see their collective agreements expire and begin bargaining talks with their respective boards.
Bruseker spoke with teachers at staff meetings, annual general meetings and casual Q & A sessions in school staff rooms, where he answered questions and concerns on a variety of topics, both local and provincial. However, the message that teachers must exert pressure on the government to make education funding a priority was at the top of the agenda.
"Teachers, students and Alberta’s education system are worth more than the 3 per cent increase in operational grants announced in the provincial government’s 2007 budget. On this tour, I am asking teachers to go to budgetmore.com and let their MLA know they want education funding made a priority," Bruseker said, adding he was pleased to hear from teachers who had not only written letters to their MLAs, but provided copies to the education critics from the opposition parties. "That type of action is what we need to keep the pressure on the government," he said.
The president’s tour will take Bruseker to cities and towns in the Association’s 10 geographic districts before the end of June.
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